The Banquet (Il Convito) eBook

And because the ancients perceived that Heaven to
be here below the cause of Love, they said that Love
was the son of Venus, as Virgil testifies in the first
book of the AEneid, where Venus says to Love:
“Oh! son, my virtue, son of the great Father,
who takest no heed of the darts of Typhoeus.”
And Ovid so testifies in the fifth book of his Metamorphoses,
when he says that Venus said to Love: “Son,
my arms, my power.” And there are Thrones
which are ordered to the government of this Heaven
in number not great, concerning which the Philosophers
and the Astrologers have thought differently, according
as they held different opinions concerning its revolutions.
But all may be agreed, as many are, in this, as to
how many movements it makes. Of this, as abbreviated
in the book of the Aggregation of the Stars, you may
find in the better demonstration of the Astrologers
that there are three: one, according as the star
moves towards its Epicycle; the other, according as
the Epicycle moves with its whole Heaven equally with
that of the Sun; the third, according as the whole
of that Heaven moves, following the movement of the
starry sphere from West to East in one hundred years
one degree. So that to these Three Movements
there are Three Movers. Again, if the whole of
this Heaven moves and turns with the Epicycle from
East to West once in each natural day, that movement,
whether it be caused by some Intelligence or whether
it be through the rapid movement of the Primum Mobile,
God knows, for to me it seems presumptuous to judge.
These Movers produce, caring for that alone, the revolution
proper to that sphere which each one moves. The
most noble form of the Heaven, which has in itself
the principle of this passive Nature, revolves, touched
by the Moving Power, which cares for this; and I say
touched, not by a bodily touch, but by a Power which
directs itself to that operation. And these Movers
are those to whom I begin to speak and to whom I put
my inquiry.

CHAPTER VII.

According to that which is said above in the third
chapter of this treatise, in order to understand well
the first part of the Song I comment on, it is requisite
to discourse of those Heavens, and of their Movers;
and in the three preceding chapters this has been
discussed. I say, then, to those whom I proved
to be Movers of the Heaven of Venus: “Ye
who, with thought intent” (i.e., with
the intellect alone, as is said above), “the
third Heaven move, Hear reasoning that is within my
heart;” and I do not say “Hear” because
they hear any sound, for they have no sense of hearing;
but I say “Hear,” meaning with that hearing
which they have, which is of the understanding through
the intellect. I say, “Hear reasoning that
is within my heart,” within me, which as yet
has not appeared externally. It is to be known
that throughout this Song, according to the one sense
(the Literal), and the other sense (the Allegorical),